Margaret Lopes (middle) prays with Jim O'Dell and Pastor Thomas Wong
of Point Community Church of North Brunswick, NJ. They and other
volunteers came to her home at 148 Mc Laughlin St. to gut her home that
was baldy damaged by Hurricane Sandy.Staten Island Advance/Hilton Flores

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Pastor David Beidel of the New Hope Community Church in West Brighton stood among the rubble in Midland Beach Saturday, helping Margaret Lopes gut a home that's been in her family for 100 years.

"It's just overwhelming for people, and I can't imagine being alone or
having two or three people to try to do this," Beidel said, as he took a
break to survey the home's partially demolished walls and pondered all
the work left do. "This has
taken 15 guys several hours, and we're still about 50 percent."

About 20 local churches have organized close to 4,000 volunteers in the weeks after Hurricane Sandy ravaged Staten Island.

Volunteers from as far away as Nevada have helped to clean out, or completely gut, more than 1,000 homes.

Dozens of tractor trailers filled with tools, water and other necessities for the clean up are storing the goods at some of the larger churches, which are then getting them out to parishioners on the ground in hard-hit neighborhoods like Midland Beach.

Because of the vast destruction, Ms. Lopes didn't know where to begin.

"I got a call from my neighbor telling me about Pastor Dave, which was just a remarkable miracle," Ms. Lopes said. "I am overwhelmed by the flood in one way and overwhelmed with joy and happiness by the incredible force of people, spirit and power."